Opining on an Outlandish Ohio Operation

He-he! I had trouble getting these in the right order-- so you're seeing some of our friends first. This is Ken and Kim (Koziol) Lee-- kids Kenneth, Andrew, Micah, Carissa. And these are the Wingert kids on The Rock. Bren, remember we painted that for you once??

This past weekend we took the fam to Cedarville for Homecoming-- it was our 15 year reunion. Had a terrific weekend! This'll be a long one cuz I included lots of pics and a few videos at the end.

We left after the kids ran their Race for Ed races Fri morning-- it was about noon when we were off. Took about 7 hours from school. Kids rode very well. Even mom did. :) Arrived in time to see part of a varsity volleyball game-- this was one of our top priorities since Katie plays volleyball. We loved seeing those college girls slam the ball! Micah enjoyed cheering and climbing around on the bleachers. I don't know if he really noticed the volleyball much at all.

After that, we went to the Homecoming Concert (Prism). Chad and I would have LOVED to have stayed for the whole thing. Esp since symphonic band played at the end. Alas, our kids thought it was some kind of torture. I guess we're not doing something right. Don't they have any appreciation for good music? We made it thru about an hour of it-- because I had sneaked them each a bag of mini marshmallows, and because K took M out in the hall for a while. There was an alumni trumpet medley, a few faculty solos, men's glee club (girls couldn't figure out why this was called "glee" because it wasn't funny at all :), women's choir, etc. Later on we could have heard Clevenger on piano and DiCuirci on euphonium and Pagnard on trumpet. Oh, well!

Saturday morning we went to the homecoming parade-- here's our good-looking group--

The kids enjoyed watching and listening, but mostly getting all the stuff they hand/throw out-- candy of all sorts, donuts, cans of rootbeer, balloons, popcorn, flowers.

Above is the new Cedarville mascot. They finally wanted to be more etymologically (is that the word?) correct-- since the nickname always was the Yellow Jackets they decided to make it look like a yellow jacket instead of a bee. Of course, change is always rough-- I think it looks kinda dumb. :)

BTW, the campus sure has changed in the 15 years since we graduated! We've been there to see different changes along the way, but the latest one seems to really change the look. They put up the new Bible building right between the old chapel parking lot and the lake-- really blocks the view of the lake, til you're around all those buildings. Everything is beautifully kept up, of course. Kinda sad that the old chapel and Bethel are gone. :)

Big fun part about going to homecoming is seeing a few of our old friends. Above is Eric Johnson, one of Chad's roommates. His wife Johanna and kids Keoni and Naia (sp?).

And, we had a brush with the famous... above is Dr. Bill Brown. Hah! Funny that we got such a good pic of him, huh? :)

After the parade, they had some inflatable things and other fun stuff set up for kids. Of course, there were a LOT of kids, but Claire still got to go down the big slide a couple times.

Then was our class reunion, in a tent by the lake. Quite windy, and, as the clouds came over, it got pretty chilly.

Here is the Lee's baby, Katie Handel, Claire, Katie. Because we see the Handels once a year or so, our kids were able to have fun together without too much shy-time.

Here's Jenna with Emily Handel. Their biggest entertainment-- collecting the confetti strips off the tables and stuffing them into J's sweatshirt pocket.

Micah was off and on fairly cranky this day-- probably because he didn't get to sleep til after 10pm in the hotel and then awoke at 6:30am. And he was really ready for a nap, so after the reunion we did a quick bookstore visit and then headed out of The 'Ville.

We stayed at the hotel that used to be the Holidome in Springfield. By the time we arrived back there Sat afternoon, M was sound asleep in the car, so Chad stayed out there with him for an hour while he napped. I took the girls in to the pool. They still had a lot of fun, but it was a bit chilly and the chlorine level was esp high. Changed the color on 2 of our swimsuits. And the girls' hair still feels funny, even after washing.

Our room overlooked the pool area-- Micah had a great time looking out of our window down at people in the pool.

On Sat we went to Ed and Linda Dungan's for supper. Chad went to their church and their home many Sundays during college. Had a great meal. Fun to visit with them again. The kids loved playing with their grandkids' toys. Micah made a great big mess with candle wax, tho-- I hope they can get it out of their carpet and couch! He's not usually destructive like that, so I wasn't paying a whole lot of attention. Sorry again, Ed and Linda!

Above is a stuffed mouse and the "nest" Jenna so carefully made for it.

Below, Ed and Linda and their daughter, Megan. Their son, Patrick, lives in NC with his wife and 3 (soon 4) kids.

Below, a wonderful painted building we stopped to admire in Ohio. SO realistic!

On Sun, we stopped at Hocking Hills State Park-- very beautiful. Chilly, but we had some layers. Only Micah seemed bothered by it. He was a little cranky during the walk, too. Poor kid-- his hands were very cold. I should have had mittens and a hat for him. Although, I don't know if he would have kept them on-- he was pretty upset by the warm coat I wanted him to wear. It's a tough transition from 95 degree days.

We asked an info lady for a recommendation for a short walk with our little kids-- she sent us to Old Man's Cave. I have to tell you that our kids were NOT very happy to do this. When we started out talking about it in the car, we heard lots of negative comments-- it's not going to be fun, I'm not going to like it, etc. (Of course, then we had a discussion about your attitude and how you can MAKE something fun). And then...

We had TONS of fun on this walk! The girls loved it. They even said so spontaneously by the end of the walk! It was beautiful, the cave was neat to see, and we had some interesting discussions. More below.

This is Old Man's Cave. I and the girls are in it.

We had fun looking at tree roots.

And someone thought it looked like these trees were kissing...

Among the interesting topics we discussed-- I told the girls the little I remembered about jr. high. Mrs. Z, Mr. Bullock, the blue pants/shirt outfit I loved, playing basketball (he-he!).

Funnier, tho, was when I told Katie that she had broken her leg when she was 3-- had her leg in a cast for a year, etc. I think I almost kinda had her wondering if it could have been true. :) Then Daddy told her that soon after that she broke her ear, and then her belly button so we had blow her up like a balloon, etc. I guess they all figured out the ruse by then.